If you’re seeking a more youthful, attractive appearance, facial fat grafting, also known as fat transfer to the face or fat injections in the face, can provide a minimally invasive alternative to facelift surgery. Fat, harvested from your abdomen, hips or thighs is purified and then injected into areas such as the lips, the cheeks, and under the eyes, as well as other areas which exhibit sagging, loss of skin elasticity and decreased collagen production.

As we age, our facial fat – particularly in the mid-face and chin area – loses some volume. This tends to draw the skin downward, making our cheeks look rather sunken; This look is often seen on people who experience excessive weight loss. To regain a more natural, healthy appearance, you can volumize your mid-face by having Dr. Robert Zubowski, MD, a board-certified New Jersey plastic surgeon with over 25 years of experience, perform facial fat transfer to restore and rejuvenate what added years have taken away.

Because it’s your own body tissue, fat grafting for the face reduces the risk of infection, allergic reaction and other complications and provides long lasting results with minimal scarring and a short recovery time. Unlike traditional surgery where general anesthetic is the gold standard, it is performed using local anesthetic. Facial fat grafting is a walk-in, walk-out procedure, so no hospital stay is involved, keeping costs and interruption of busy schedules down.

Facial fat grafting can include under eye fat transfers and cheek fat injections. If you look around your eyes, you may notice that your lower lids have both bags and a valley or indention near your nose. This feature, called a tear trough, can create a dark shadow under the eyes that is difficult to camouflage, giving a gaunt, tired look. Filling in this trough through an under eye fat transfer, and then highlighting your cheekbones, can promote a refreshed look to your entire face.

Fat grafting of the cheeks is used to repair defects of adipose tissue in the face, produced by aging or pathologies that affect this tissue. Cheek fat transfer is ideal for patients who, due to aging, have lost fat padding in certain areas of the face, or for those individuals who exhibit a lack of constitutional development in the cheek area. This technique is also ideal for those patients with facial asymmetries.

If you wish to undergo facial fat grafting, you must be in good general health and have sufficient fat deposits to harvest for facial fat injections. Injecting fat into the face is most commonly performed on patients who are in their 30s and 40s and who are experiencing mild signs of aging and loss of facial volume. During a comprehensive initial consultation, Dr. Robert Zubowski, MD, a leading New Jersey board-certified plastic surgeon, will evaluate your cosmetic goals and medical history to determine if facial fat injections may be right for you.

One of our major goals at the Robert Zubowski MD Center for Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery is to provide you with an excellent facial fat transfer experience from the moment you step into our office and going forward.